The Duel Between Gaming Magazines and Websites

The New York Times has up a piece looking at the ongoing battle between websites and magazines in the world of games journalism. With magazine subscriptions falling every year and a non-stop churn of news online, the article examines the ways that mags try to stay competitive, and the views of the gamers that read them. "The circulation for PC Gamer, a leading magazine from Future US, shrank to 210,369 this year from 300,271 in 2003, according to the Audit Bureau of Circulations. Magazine publishers say that readers want longer features and in-depth articles as a counterpoint to the short, bloglike pieces they find online. But Kyle Orland, a freelance journalist who writes a media coverage column for Gamedaily.com, wondered if that strategy was working, saying that when a large feature is published, it doesn't get read. 'Attention spans are just getting so small that readers don't know what they want,' Mr. Orland said."

Comments

Nonsense

[Cy Sperling]

Magazine publishers say that readers want longer features and in-depth articles as a counterpoint to the short, bloglike pieces they find online. But Kyle Orland, a freelance journalist who writes a media coverage column for Gamedaily.com, wondered if that strategy was working, saying that when a large feature is published, it doesn't get read. 'Attention spans are just getting so small that readers don't know what they want,' Mr. Orland said."

That is just plain ridiculous. If I am eagerly anticipating game X, and a magazine has an in-depth 8 page preview- of course I am going to read it. Are we all such twitchy ADD zombies that nobody can maintain their attention for more than a page? I call bullshit on that...

Re:Nonsense

[edwdig]

That is just plain ridiculous. If I am eagerly anticipating game X, and a magazine has an in-depth 8 page preview- of course I am going to read it. Are we all such twitchy ADD zombies that nobody can maintain their attention for more than a page? I call bullshit on that...

If it's an 8 page preview because it has 1 paragraph and 15 ads per page, then it's not going to keep many people's attention.

Re:Nonsense

[DocSavage64109]

You actually trust magazine reviews to tell the honest truth in a review? I remember buying Outpost based on reviews, and it was quite disappointing when it came to actual gameplay.

Quote from wikipedia:

Initial reviews of Outpost were enthusiastic about the game. Most notoriously, the American version of PC Gamer rated the game at 93%, one of its highest ratings ever for the time. It was later made known that the reviewers had in fact played beta versions of the game, and had been promised certain features would be implemented, but never were.
Indeed, many of the features described in the game's own documentation simply did not exist in the game at all. These included the ability to enter diplomatic relations with the rebel colony and the ability to build roads, among other things. Many of these gameplay aspects were later patched in, though in appearance only, as many of them failed to have any meaningful effect on gameplay.
Following the release of the game, the game's general bugginess and perceived mediocre gameplay, along with the lack of features described in most of the game's reviews and the game's own documentation led to a minor backlash against the computer game magazines of the time by consumers who bought the game based on their reviews.

Why I still get a couple gaming mags in the mail

[Pojut]

I still have active subscriptions to Game Informer and PC Gamer because they make for great reading while on the toilet...yesyesyes, I know I could just bring my laptop in there, but...well...I'd rather not melt the plastic, if you know what I'm saying...

Plus, while this happens rarely, there are times when I get a gaming mag in the mail and there is an article on a game that I haven't heard of from checking the normal sources online...again, doesn't happen often, but it does happen.

Duel?

[Aladrin]

Doesn't a duel imply that both parties are actively attacking each other? Game sites don't -care- about magazines at all, except for Japanese ones where they can scan the page and show that Mega Pony X3 is coming out over there sometime in the future. Local magazines get no attention whatsoever.

Gamers only want game news. The interviews with developers and demos are nice, but the best stuff is always available online somewhere. And any developer that ignores the websites in favor of magazines loses a -lot- of free advertisement that gets to the target -immediately.-

I really don't see anything useful in magazines any more... The stuff they used to have like cheats, maps, etc... All of that is gone. Now the companies sell the maps and walkthroughs directly to the consumer, and cheats are always available online without having to figure out which backissue of Generic Gamer Monthly it was in.

No, it's not a 'duel'... It's 'I'm not dead yet!' Sorry bud, 'You will be soon!'

Delay

[dunezone]

Its all about delay. I have a game informer subscription that came with the purchase of my 360. At the end of the magazine they have what will be featured in the next magazine. Unfortunately, whatever is usually featured next month is already online with write-ups and also videos to go along with it at sites like gamespot or IGN.

Either way though, Its good reading material on the pooper.

Next Generation Magazine and sometimes EGM

[Ang31us]

As far as I am concerned, the day of the video game magazine died when Next Generation Magazine died. They simply covered the industry very well from many angles. After its parent company cancelled the publication, I no longer had any reason to read video game magazines, because I could obtain the content online. Sure, I picked up Electronic Gaming Monthly from time to time when they covered a game that I was very interested in, but Next-Gen magazine was the gold standard as far as I was concerned. I'm glad that some of the editors got back together and formed the www.next-gen.biz website.

... In Japan

[Ecuador]

Actually there is a solution and the Japanese know it. A few years ago a Japanese magazine emailed me requesting to add a freeware tool I had made to the CD they include with their publication and asked if I also wanted a free subscription. Sure I said, but I must say I was not prepared for what I would start to receive every month for the following 3-4 years...
So, their magazine was all about games, and multimedia, and naked girls! There was no coherent order of things, on one page there was a game review with adult ads, on the next there was a nude model pictorial, further "decorated" with (regular - non-nudie) pc-software ads, then an article on p2p full of adult, game, software etc ads. There were "combination" articles, like nudie web site reviews, or adult PC game reviews and always in no "sensible" categorization/order in the magazine. The included CD was similar. Game demos, multimedia software, japanese porn videos, all nicely aggregated within the autoplay interface.
After surviving the culture shock, I decided they probably knew their target audience too well and I should just appreciate the publishers ingenuity.